doctor wu:Ok, I'm a moron and freely admit I know nothing about snakes, blah blah, so here goes. Why is that guy able to play with that thing without being attacked? Is it in some kind of docile state?

Speaking as a biologist who has worked with snakes both as a professional scientist and as a hobbyist snake keeper as a kid, snakes are really easy to manipulate safely. Large snakes like boas and pythons are especially prone to being relatively sedate. They seem to know that they are too big for you to eat, and you are too big for them to eat. They can act defensively of course, but gentle handling is often enough to calm them down.